When Macon County officials started their 2020-21 budget process back in early February, COVID-19 was barely a blip on their radar. 

Just like every other local government in the nation, the Town of Franklin is facing uncertainty when it comes to trying to budget for the 2020-21 fiscal year. 

Waynesville Town Manager Rob Hites, an experienced professional with almost 40 years in municipal government, called the current budget year a strange one, and apparently town aldermen have heard him loud and clear. 

As local government units across the state work on their annual budgets a variety of approaches have been taken by administrators, but in one Haywood County town, it’s pretty much business as usual. 

As Harrah’s Cherokee Casino marks its seventh week of closure due to the Coronavirus Pandemic, leadership for the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians is planning for the tribe’s financial future in the face of evaporated casino revenues. 

County governments are in the midst of planning for their 2020-21 fiscal budgets that have to be approved by the end of June, but the COVID-19 Pandemic is going to throw a wrench in their ability to project revenues for the remainder of the year.

You often hear that North Carolina’s public universities are the “crown jewel” of the state. While this is indeed true, the deadlock in Raleigh over funding for a new budget continues to hamstring our state’s public institutions. Some of the most urgent needs can be found at Western Carolina University, where the lack of funding is beginning to negatively affect students and faculty.

Haywood County Schools board members got their first look at a proposed budget for the next fiscal year last week, which contained few surprises and continued to concentrate on some much-needed capital improvement projects. 

A state-level budget stalemate that’s been ongoing since July could cause real problems — and real changes — at Western Carolina University if it continues much longer. 

Waynesville’s elected officials, administrators and department staff were supposed to spend Feb. 21 talking about the year’s upcoming budget — which they did, for nearly six hours — but the board also took immediate action on several issues deemed too important to wait.